Under your skin feels like home
by RecklessAbandon123
Summary: It all starts with her hating him, or at least trying to hate him. Klami fic.


**Under your skin feels like home**

A/N: I don't even know why I bother with posting things here, but anyhoe. You can still enjoy it and hope this fic gives you the same feels shipping Klaus and Cami give me

It all starts with her hating him at first, or at least trying to hate him.

Klaus keeps her there without her consent, _forces_ her to stay by his side and hear him out. Cami spends the hours she sits and types up Klaus' story burning him with silent hatred that at times, when she can't take it anymore and she refuses to bottle it up because Cami knows all too well what happens to those who do, not so silent.

She knows what he is and is aware of his compulsion to keep her there, but at times Cami feels all the anger and the rage disippating and being replaced with sympathy and with something that it can't be, but it definitely resembles a physical pain in her chest every time she really listens.

When this happens, it's not the countless of abominable things he has done and are now filling pages and pages of his so-called memoir what she focuses on, but the other things that had been done to him to change him to the man she had before her.

Klaus doesn't need her pity, she knows it and he knows it, but there are some things she has to write that can bring tears to her eyes. She doesn't know what's happening. First she's just sitting at her usual spot behind the desk and Klaus is treading and retreading a patch of carpet that should have worn off by now. There are tears running down Cami's eyes, her vision blurring in and out of focus as she stubbornly tries to hide the obvious fact that she is crying.

One moment she's all on her own, and the next instance she finds herself enclosed into two strong arms that lift her from her seat and bring her close to a surprisingly warm chest.

"It's alright, love." he says in an attempt to comfort her, but Cami cries even harder because she knows it isn't, not when Klaus is carrying the images she only momentarily witnesses- and are enough to make her feel like that- with him all the time.

A little while goes by, and nothing really changes. Cami goes home thinking that she is slowlly losing her mind, and the next day, when she is with Klaus again, she knows she's perfectly sane even though she doesn't have any way to let her free-willed self know of that.

Or maybe not perfectly sane, before Cami finds herself more often than not trying to find excuses for everything Klaus has ever done instead of feeling repulsed by him. She doesn't know what is going on with her anymore. Maybe compulsion _is_ messing with her head. The only problem is that she is perfectly aware of everything that is going on inside her and she knows it has nothing to do with Klaus' mind control.

But what does really this turmoil of feelings inside her even she can't always identify means?

It starts as small flutters in her stomach every time he's too close for comfort, but even though Klaus has lived a thousand years, has watched empires burn and burnt quite a number of them himself, that feeling couldn't be described as fear. It's not fear that makes her heart beat faster, almost erratically. She knows the feeling of the rabbit staring hypnotized at the wolf moments before it is eaten and still too compulsed- oh, the irony- to attempt to escape. The feeling of boiling anger all directed at Klaus and, sometimes, at herself, cursing through her bloodstream.

But this, this itching, this sense of emptiness that doesn't come from the loss of her brother or from the missing holes in her memory but from something that seems like the loss of contact, the absence of two strong arms around her and-

She's tired of all this. She's confused and oh so tired, but she has somewhere along the way stopped caring. Cami finds herself watching Klaus with wicked fascination. The way he moves with a natural elegance and grace that is only enhanced by all the years he has been walking on this earth, the soft movement of his brush as those paint-stained long fingers move it on the canvas, the way his blue eyes seem to glisten a bit every time he recounts one particularly painful memory or something he has done which he regrets. He never expresses his remorse, but Cami can tell it is there. It's hiding in the small crease his fair eyebrows form, or the nervous twitching of his hand even he doesn't seem to be aware of. This mainly happens when he talks about his siblings- the word 'dagger' is repeated more times than one would think is possible.

One day however, Klaus seems in a mood too sullen even for his own standards. And then he does, or rather says something that leave Cami speechless "I'm sorry for keeping you here. This is all messed up but it's who I am, can't you see it? I can't have someone by my side unless I compel them to. But even you hate me, don't you?"

Maybe it is the dejected look on his face, or the way his eyes dart at everywhere but her direction, but then he looks resigned and just stares straight at her. His eyes are so blue they disarm her. Cami stands up, the sound the chair makes as it scratches against the wooden floor a distant echo in her head. Everything seems fainter in constrast to the defeaning pounding of her heart in her ears. He can hear it too, Cami knows it, but she doesn't care. She's tired of being confused, ready to abandon everything and not care about the consequences.

So no one can judge her when she slowly makes her way towards Klaus. She stops inches away from him, sees his body go tense by their close proximity once initiated by her. Cami is almost too afraid to move- Heaven, she really is like a small rabbit next to the big bad wolf- but most surprisingly of all, she isn't fearing for her safety but for Klaus.

She doesn't want to scare him, doesn't want to make a move too abrupt that would make him act just like any wounded wild animal would. When Cami finally musters the courage to raise her trembling hand to his face-level, he seems curious, but thankfully not wary. His skin is soft, his short stubble tickling her hand slightly. She lets out a shuddering sigh of relief and then she is into his arms once again and this hole, this void inside of her feels finally filled.

After a brief moment of hesitation Klaus' arms finally enfold her and she feels like home. This realisation is so shocking and life-altering that she feels a certain kind of wetness staining her cheeks. The kiss is as sudden as her realisation, and it is both soft and rough, and oh-so- perfect. Klaus doesn't complain even if it is salty from her silent tears, nor when she holds onto him like a dragon holds its gold so that she can keep the emptines from returning for just a bit longer.


End file.
